The rabbi of Berlin, Rabbi Yehuda Teichtal, on Sunday morning urged Jews to continue to wear their yarmulkes with pride, after a German government official advised that Jews not wear the head coverings “everywhere, all the time.”
“The combating of anti-Semitism is a top priority so it is appreciated that this is being addressed by top representatives of the government,” Rabbi Teichtal wrote on Facebook.
“At the same time, the KIPA is a clear symbol of Jewish identity and should be worn with PRIDE.”
“Of course all the necessary security precautions need to be taken. At the same time, hiding our identity was never the solution, we should be always be PROUD of who we are. AM ISRAEL CHAI.”
Read more at Arutz Sheva.

White House senior adviser and presidential son-in law Jared Kushner is expected to visit Israel next week ahead of the rollout of the Trump administration’s long-awaited peace proposal for the Israelis and Palestinians, reported Israeli public broadcaster Kan.
Kushner will meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ahead of the plan’s release, which will begin with an economic workshop in Bahrain scheduled for June 25-26.
While Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates announced that it will send a delegation, the Palestinian Authority rejected an invitation.

Police and the Israel Securities Authority say they have enough evidence of wrongdoing against executives of Israel’s largest construction company including its former chairwoman, billionaire Shari Arison.
The Lahav 433 special investigations unit has wrapped up a year-long investigation of tens of millions of dollars in bribes paid by the Shikun and Binui company to public officials in several African countries in order to win lucrative building projects.
Read more at Times of Israel.

With preparations for the upcoming Siyum HaShas on January 1, 2020 at MetLife Stadium well underway, we take a moment to mark the yahrtzeit today of Rabbi Moshe Sherer zt”l, legendary leader of Agudas Yisroel.
Rabbi Sherer was one of the visionaries who foresaw the growth of Daf Yomi and the Siyum HaShas, believing back in the 1980s that a larger venue would be needed for this once-in-seven-and-a-half-years event.
“More than a celebration,” Rabbi Sherer proclaimed at the Siyum HaShas almost four decades ago, “it is a powerful demonstration of the nitzchiyus of Torah, of netzach Yisroel lo yeshaker.”
The explosion of Daf Yomi is credit, in large part, to Rabbi Sherer, who saw the potential and growth of the program.
The following video provides a glimps...

THE FOLLOWING IS VIA YWN
Moments ago, immigration authorities in the U.K. reportedly refused entry to Sholom Rubashkin.
Sources confirm to YWN that Rubashkin arrived at the Manchester Airport, where his entry was denied.
Rubashkin has been travelling the world speaking to audiences about his experience, and giving Chizuk to thousands. He was scheduled to speak this Monday and Tuesday in Manchester, in events that were advertised throughout the community.
Multipile sources tell YWN that one or two individuals in the community informed authorities that Rubashkin had a criminal background, and he was reportedly denied entry on that basis. Read more at YWN

Topshop is closing all of its U.S. stores after its operator, Arcadia Group, filed for bankruptcy, according to a report.
The British retailerOpens a New Window. was expected to begin liquidating inventory in 11 Topshop and Topman stores in the U.S. this weekend after announcing all locations in the nation will shutter their doors, the Wall Street JournalOpens a New Window. reported. Topshop opened its first U.S. store in New York City in 2009 and expanded to other cities including Los Angeles, Miami, Las Vegas, Houston and Chicago.
About 800 people are employed at these stores. The closing dates of all the locations were not released.
Arcadia is also planning to shut down 23 more stores in the U.K. and Ireland, the BBC Opens a New Window.reported...

A joint project of the Palestinian Authority and the European Union is taking over a strategic area in the center of Gush Etzion, “restoring” an historic village that never existed.
Film credit: Regavim
The Palestinian Authority, aided by the European Union, is expanding its program of land-seizure, taking control of a strategic area in the heart of the Etzion Bloc, between Route 60 and Neveh Daniel.
Over the past two years, the PA has created, out of thin air, an “historic” village – that just so happens to be located on a strategic point adjacent to the Jerusalem-Hebron highway. The name given to this new “ancient” village: Shoshkhalah.
Regavim’s Field Coordinator for Judea and Samaria, Yishai Hemo, describes the methodology: &...

Trump downplayed recent North Korean missile tests in a tweet yesterday, and also referred to North Korea’s Kim Jong Un’s criticism of Biden, who recently announced his 2020 presidential bid.
“North Korea fired off some small weapons, which disturbed some of my people, and others, but not me,” Trump wrote. “I have confidence that Chairman Kim will keep his promise to me, & also smiled when he called Swampman Joe Biden a low IQ individual, & worse. Perhaps that’s sending me a signal?”
On NBC’s “Meet the Press,” host Todd referenced Trump’s tweet, and asked Sanders whether Americans should be “concerned that the president of the United States is essentially siding with a murderous authoritarian dictator over a ...

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said he is calling a meeting with party leaders Sundayb night to try to find a compromise that allow a coalition to be formed and avoid a second election.
“I am now making my last effort to form a right-wing government and to prevent unnecessary elections. I gave the partners a proposal for a solution. It is based on the principles that the army has established and on the data that the army has established – there is no reason to reject this.”
Netanyahu added, “I’m going to invite all party leaders tonight, I want to talk to them and try together to prevent unnecessary elections.”
Read more at Arutz Sheva.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights sparked considerable excitement in Israel, leading to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s call for the founding of a Golan Heights community named after Trump.
The community, which is still in its early stages, will house 97 families. These past few weeks its popularity has grown, and due to a large number of inquiries, the settlement has even created a hotline.
“We have received close to 100 inquiries, mostly from families in the United States and Canada who say that they want to make aliyah and live in ‘Trump city,’ ” said Golan Regional Council head Haim Rokach.
The new community will be built on what is now part of Bruchim, which was founded in 1991 and...

Yisrael Beytenu party leader Avidgor Liberman said Friday he has been approached by members of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party to join a government without the premier, a claim quickly denied by the ruling party.
With just days to go until the May 28 deadline for Netanyahu to form a government, Liberman has ruled out joining a coalition unless Likud agrees to a number of core demands, thus far making it impossible for Netanyahu to assemble a ruling majority of right-wing and religious parties.
“We endorsed Netanyahu for prime minister when we met with the president, and we won’t recommend anyone else, said Liberman, “even though there were overtures to us, from inside and outside of the Likud, to take another route.” Speaking at an event in t...

Jerusalem - Residents returning to inspect the damage after a Central Israeli town was nearly burned to the ground were amazed to discover an entire room of seforim that were somehow spared by the flames. The books belonged to the town’s founder, Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach, who passed away in 1994.
The discovery was reported by Arutz Sheva (http://bit.ly/2VT0uJk), which joined residents of Mevo Modiim as they toured the blackened remains of Carlebach’s home. Video captured as the group toured the home showed piles of charred pages and blackened walls, with one member exclaiming, “I don’t believe. I don’t believe it,” as he entered a room filled with books that had somehow eluded the blaze.
The room is believed to contain most of Rabbi Carlebach...

Jerusalem - Israel’s president said Sunday he is shocked by a German official’s comment that he wouldn’t advise Jews to wear skullcaps in parts of the country, which is drawing mixed reactions at home.
Felix Klein, the government’s anti-Semitism commissioner, was quoted Saturday as saying: “I cannot recommend to Jews that they wear the skullcap at all times everywhere in Germany.” He didn’t elaborate on what places and times might be risky.
“The statement of the German government’s anti-Semitism commissioner that it would be preferable for Jews not wear a kippa in Germany out of fear for their safety, shocked me deeply,” Israeli President Reuven Rivlin said in a statement.
He added that “we will never submit, will never l...

Many U.S. households find themselves in a fragile position financially, even in an economy with an unemployment rate near a 50-year low, according to a Federal Reserve survey.
The Fed’s 2018 report on the economic well-being of households, published Thursday, indicated “most measures” of well-being and financial resilience “were similar to, or slightly better than, those in 2017.” The slight improvement coincided with a decline in the average unemployment rate to 3.9% last year, from 4.3% in 2017.
But despite the advance, the results of the 2018 survey indicated that almost 40% of Americans would still struggle in the face of a $400 financial emergency. The statistic, which was a bit better than in the 2017 report, has become a favorite rejoinder to Presiden...

French police were hunting a suspected suitcase bomber on Friday after an explosion in the central city of Lyon that injured 13 people, officials said.
The suspect was captured on security video leaving a case in front of a bakery shortly before an explosion occurred at around 5:30 p.m., police sources and local mayor Denis Broliquier said.
Interior Ministry officials initially said eight people had been injured, but police sources later put the number hurt at 13, with none of the injuries thought to be life-threatening.
President Emmanuel Macron, who was beginning a broadcast address as news of the explosion broke, described the incident as an “attack” with no fatalities. “My thoughts are with the injured,” he said.
The Paris anti-terrorism prosecutor opened an...

A leading French Jewish organization said on Friday that it had “learned with consternation” that the man accused of murdering Jewish pensioner Sarah Halimi, H'yd, in April 2017 will not face a criminal trial.
In a statement carried by the Jewish publication Alliance, the BNVCA — a Paris-based group that works with victims of antisemitic attacks — said that the investigating magistrate in the Halimi case had concluded that the murderer, Kobili Traore, was heavily intoxicated on marijuana when he committed the killing, and mentally unfit to stand trial.
The BNVCA did not disclose its source for this information, which was unreported in the French media on Friday.
Referring to the numerous political and legal obstacles encountered by the Halimi family in their...

A leading mortgage settlement and title insurance company, First American Financial Corporation, left hundreds of millions of customer records accessible on the web, including personal information such as Social Security numbers, according to a report on a security blog Friday.
Though no data is known to have been taken, the scale of the security lapse was massive, putting at risk 885 millions records from an unknown numbers of customers, wrote Brian Krebs, of KrebsonSecurity, which covers breaches, hacks and online crime. Based on a tip from a real estate developer who found the vulnerability, Krebs wrote that anybody with access to a web portal for the company could have gained access to documents from other customers by altering digits in the web address.
The tactic, Krebs reported, c...

On one side of the English Channel, supporters see it as the greatest peace project the world has ever known.
But seen from that sceptered isle drifting scarcely 20 miles out at sea, the European Union looks more like a political assassin, one with a particularly rapacious appetite for British prime ministers.
The EU claimed its fourth victim in the past three decades on Friday, as a choked-up Theresa May announced that, having failed to get Britain out of the bloc, she would resign as leader of the Conservative Party on June 7 and make way for a new Conservative prime minister this summer. Three of her predecessors have also been evicted from Downing Street while trying to crack the code of Europe.
Now, a growing list of Conservative politicians are jockeying to replace her. Each has p...

For two and half years, Mexican drug kingpin Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán has lived in solitary confinement-with nearly no ability to communicate with the outside world.
Now, with Guzman allegedly showing symptoms of distress and sleep deprivation, his defense team had several requests for U.S. District Judge Brian Cogan earlier this month: two hours of outdoor exercise every week, the same food and drink as other inmates, permission to buy six bottles of water a week and earplugs.
“This deprivation of sunlight and fresh air, over an excessive 27-month period, is causing psychological scarring,” CNN reported the letter said. It called the conditions “cruel and unusual punishment” in violation of the Eighth Amendment.
Federal prosecutors wer...

There is no doubt North Korea violated United Nations Security Council resolutions by testing ballistic missiles this month, national security adviser John Bolton said on Saturday, adding that President Donald Trump is determined to maintain sanctions pressure on the regime until it backs down.
The comments mark the first time a senior administration official has confirmed that North Korea launched ballistic missiles in contravention of U.N. resolutions, with officials appearing reluctant until now to make such a clear statement to demonstrate their willingness to restart dialogue.
But in a tweet just after 7:30 a.m. Sunday local time, Trump directly contradicted his national security adviser, writing, “North Korea fired off some small weapons, which disturbed some of my people, an...